I SEE Boris Johnson is repeating the falsehood that a “promise” was made in the run-up to the 2014 independence referendum that it would be a “once-in-a-lifetime/once-in-a-generation” event. How utterly predictable: the Unionist shower are having to grasp at whatever straws they can, after all, given the case they made for Scotland remaining in the UK at that time has been proved beyond doubt to be ordure of the first order.
It’s time Nicola Sturgeon and other indy-supporting MSPs and MPS were vociferous in their refutation of this falsehood, and as often as is necessary. As per my previous epistle in The National regarding this, in countering this tiresomely desperate nonsense we need to make something like the following salient points, in my view: 1) If you look up what Alex Salmond said, it’s explicit that he was expressing a belief as to the rarity of the opportunity before us (there’s a wee bit of a clue where he says “I believe”!).
2) Based on any rational, logical consideration of the matter, it couldn’t possibly have been a “promise” because such a commitment is not in the gift of any FM, government, political party or leader, or politician – we live in a democracy, not some repressive regime where those in power can dictate, or seek to dictate, what we can or cannot vote on for decades to come; it’s the people of Scotland who are sovereign. In addition, the notion that the party whose very raison d’etre is achieving independence for Scotland would issue some kind of promise not to campaign for another vote for yonks is utterly ludicrous! Beyond satire, in fact!
3) Circumstances change – and boy, have they changed! There’s probably no need to elaborate here. Suffice to say, the lies and false promises of the pro-Union parties and their hangers-on have rendered the 2014 indyref result null and void.
READ MORE: Michael Russell: Tory Twitter chat shows they want to rig indyref2
Surely no-one with a basic grasp of democracy could possibly argue with the second point?
Mo Maclean
Glasgow
AS I watch the charade and travesty that is the Johnson premiership, I remember that his degree is in “Literae Humaniores”, or Classics as the plebeians would call it. It’s maybe instructive to remember this when looking at his career and his actions.
Like the Gracchi brothers of Republican Rome, he sees himself as the representative of the people. Like the Gracchi he is of affluent stock but seeks to portray himself as the tribune of the people in his role as Prime Minister.
As the Gracchi ranged themselves against the Conservative “Optimates” in the Senate, so too does Johnson range himself against parliament, claiming he alone truly personifies the will of the people and he alone can deliver what the people want, all 17.4 million of them. He discounts the 16.8 million who oppose his view.
Vox Populi Vox Dei is Johnson’s motto in this struggle.
His inflammatory language stokes the fires of Brexiteer temperance and already we hear of death threats and threats of violence against Remainers.
I’ve yet to hear of Brexiteers being threatened by those who seek to remain.
The Gracchi brothers brought Roman politics to boiling point, leading to the murder of Tiberius Gracchus and the suicide a few years later of the younger Gracchus, Gaius, and the mass arrest and execution of thousands of his followers.
When an unelected PM rants in parliament about “surrender”, “traitors” and inveighs against that parliament’s members, setting himself against it, and he is watched by racially nationalistic driven fanatics and uses the murder of an MP to make his point, then we are heading for real trouble in our society.
Johnson, who sees himself as the Churchill de nos jours, is too intelligent not to understand the power of words. He is a dangerous individual.
I’m sure our esteemed PM knows we can always learn from history, even very ancient history.
John McArthur
Glasgow
HAMISH MacPherson is surely correct and Linda Horsburgh (Letters, September 27) wrong when she complains about him writing about two Acts of Union. The sequence of events I learnt in my university Constitutional History class was that commissioners from the two countries met and, after a bit of a struggle, agreed to a Treaty of Union. They then went to their respective parliaments to report the agreed terms and the separate parliaments, having accepted the terms, reluctantly in Scotland’s case, each passed an Act of Union, dissolving itself in order to form a new parliament of the UK.
We are well aware that England has behaved as if they charitably admitted a few Scots to THEIR CONTINUING parliament, indeed that is what is taught in history classes in English schools. We also know that in 2013 the UK Government accepted a report from two Cambridge professors which claimed that Scotland does not legally exist. No wonder Fluffy Mundell could say we are not a partner in the UK, merely a part of it.
I do agree with Linda that there is widespread misuse of the two terms relating to 1707 and also that we should be talking up the fact that the Union is based on an international treaty and pointing out how often that treaty has been breached.
Andrew M Fraser
Inverness
DO you ever despair when having a seemingly hopeless conversation about indy with a dedicated Unionist? Try this. Imagine that the union of parliaments had never happened. Would the citizens of Scotland and their parliamentarians be campaigning to form a union with that lot at Westminster? See you in Edinburgh at the AUOB march!
Jim Addison
Finechty
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